ghattis

ghattis

Alternative Spellings

Definitions

Example Sentences

Look at that bunch of khateysim over there. What are they doing here?

Languages of Origin

Textual Hebrew, Yiddish, Afrikaans

Etymology

Afrikaans gat ('hole, anus') and Yiddish/Hebrew khates ('sins'), as in the phrase khates-neurim ('sins of youth'). This phono-semantic matching / wordplay seems to be aided by the co-occurrence of the word "khet" with the Hebrew word "bor," which sounds similar to Boer, the Afrikaans word for farmer/peasant. As Michael Wex writes: "Khatas derives from the Hebrew khet, a sin, and means sin-offering, a sort of kapore sacrifice. Khatas retains this meaning in Yiddish, where it acquires the additional, and more common, sense of sinner or rogue. There is a well-known line in the Mishnaic tractate Avos, which every Orthodox male studies every Saturday between Passover and Rosh Hashana: "Eyn bor yerey khet, a bor [uncouth ignoramus] is not afraid of sin. The coincidence of sound was too much to ignore" (Born to Kvetch, 87).

Who Uses This

Older: Jews who are middle-aged and older

Regions

South Africa

Dictionaries

None

Notes

Plural khateysim / ghatesim.

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